Nursing workforce

Nursing shortages in health systems around the world are having negative impacts on the health and well being of populations. They pose unprecedented challenges for policy makers and planners in high and low-income countries alike. Inadequate human resources planning and management, poor deployment practices, internal and external migration, high attrition (due to poor work environments, low professional satisfaction and inadequate remuneration), the impact of HIV and AIDS, and under investment in human resources are just some of the critical issues driving nursing shortages.

International Council of Nurses (see below) and the Florence Nightingale International Foundation undertook a Global Nursing Review Initiative: Policy Options and Solutions. This review identified five key areas of intervention. These include: workforce policy and planning; positive practice environments and organisational performance; recruitment and retention, addressing in-country maldistribution, and out-migration; and nursing leadership. The report The global nursing shortage: priority areas for intervention emerged from this two year process and looks at key issues in nursing shortages.

The 2006 World Health Assembly resolution called for nursing and midwifery skills and services to be strengthened. This resolution recognises the importance of these health professionals in attaining global health goals. It invites countries to put nursing and midwifery in a prominent position within health systems to increase their participation in the decision making process, and commits the WHO to increase the number of nurses and midwives in its own programmes.

Nursing and midwifery services provide a platform from which to scale up health interventions to assist in meeting national health targets. A variety of problems, however, continue to undermine the contribution of nursing and midwifery services. Nursing and midwifery services: strategic directions 2002-2008 provides an evidence-based framework for action that will be undertaken by WHO and its partners to support countries dedicated to improving the quality of nursing and midwifery services. The document introduces the strategic directions, key result areas and objectives with the expected results to achieve them and discusses how nursing and midwifery services form an integral part of health services.

The International Council of Nurses (ICN)

ICN is a federation of national nurses' associations, representing nurses in more than 120 countries. Operated by nurses for nurses, ICN works to ensure quality nursing care for all, sound health policies globally, the advancement of nursing knowledge, and the presence worldwide of a respected nursing profession and a competent and satisfied nursing workforce.

The International Centre for Human Resources in Nursing, set up by the ICN in 2006, is dedicated to strengthening the nursing workforce globally through the development, ongoing monitoring and dissemination of comprehensive information, standards and tools on nursing human resources policy, management, research and practice.